


Cherry-picking my way into your heart

by Kyuu



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Backstory, Dreams, M/M, Non-alcoholic Beverages
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-28
Updated: 2011-12-28
Packaged: 2017-10-28 08:10:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,051
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/305736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kyuu/pseuds/Kyuu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first time Arthur and Eames meet isn't the first time Arthur has met Eames.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cherry-picking my way into your heart

**Author's Note:**

> Written for cherrybina's Arthur/Eames Fluff Meme, Round 3.

The first time they meet isn't the first time Arthur has met Eames.

Rather, the first time Arthur met Eames was also, coincidentally, the first time he pulled a con. All under the careful scrutiny of the military, of course, back when dreamshare was still new and the most elegant way to steal information from someone's head was to barrel through their dreamscape and hope not to get mauled by projections.

That time, though, they were trying to extract from a highly militarized brigadier general who may-or-may-not have leaked information about the somnacin project into the black market but definitely knew he was being investigated, which rendered all their usual methods moot. Instead, the team assigned to investigate General Hendry was told to try out some of the extraction techniques they'd learned from the British SAS team they had a joint training session with last month.

The dream was of a replica of a high-class club that Hendry liked to frequent, the same club members of a number of high-up mafia members had recently been spotted in. Arthur was on lookout—what they called it then—discretely keeping an eye on projections while sipping from a gin-and-tonic that tasted like water because, back then, Arthur had been too young to know what gin-and-tonic tasted like.

Arthur sat in the bar stool with his back to the bar and pretended to people watch. The bartender tapped him on the shoulder and said something that he missed, and Arthur had to turn back to ask him to repeat it. As he turned, he caught a glance of a blonde in a slinky red dress sipping from a glass of red wine.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t catch that,” he said.

The bartender pressed a Shirley Temple towards him. “The patron from down the bar sent this.”

Arthur stared at the drink for a beat, appalled, before whipping around to glare at the sender, only to double take when he realized a guy was sitting in the place the blonde had been only moments ago. He—the _projection_ , Arthur reminded himself—winked at him, got up, and sauntered towards Arthur with wine glass in hand, apparently having mistaken Arthur’s surprise for interest. Arthur glanced back at the rest of the projections nervously, but none of them seemed to notice that anything strange had happened.

“Implying that someone is too young to drink is usually not a good way to win them over,” Arthur said when the man had gotten close enough to hear him. He had no interest in talking, but he also didn’t want to make a scene and agitate any of the other projections.

“Ah, but what if I was only interested in seeing you eat the cherry?” the man asked. Arthur almost blinked again in surprise—he was British, an unlikely candidate to be hanging around in a high-end Chicagoan club, so likely one of his teammates’ projections of someone from the British SAS.

Arthur sighed, plucked the cherry out of the glass, and popped it in his mouth. “There,” he said, throwing the stem onto a napkin, “satisfied?”

“Oh, hardly,” the projection said, sitting down. “How could I be satisfied when you’re sitting here by yourself, looking so lonesome?” He flashed Arthur a crooked grin.

Now that the projection was sitting so close, Arthur finally got the chance to get a good look at him, and even in the dim lighting of the club, Arthur could tell he was quite handsome. The type of person Arthur wouldn’t mind making a pass at him if he weren’t working or in the military, or if the man was real and not just a projection.

“I’m not lonely,” Arthur said, turning back around to look at the other projections. “I’m working.”

“By looking at other people? That doesn’t sound very fun.”

“Yes, by looking at other people. Please leave me alone, Mr—”

“Eames.” The projection grinned at him again. “And I assure you I’m much more fun than staring at a room full of people, darling.”

Before Arthur could reply, a waiter approached them and interrupted. “Sir,” he said to Arthur, “General Hendry would like a word with you.”

Arthur nodded at Eames before getting up and following the waiter away.

“Ciao, darling,” Eames said and waved once.

When Arthur turned back to catch one last glance of him, Eames—or rather, the woman in the red dress—was already turned back towards the bar, sipping from her glass of red wine.

 

“What were you doing?” the waiter, or rather, Corporal Joshua P. Buckley hissed at Arthur as soon as they were out of the projection’s earshot.

“He approached me,” Arthur said. Then, he narrowed his eyes. Buckley’s forging had improved dramatically since the session they had with the SAS last month, though not enough to forge anyone Hendry might be associating with which was he was he was still playing a non-descript waiter. Still, it didn’t take a genius to put two and two together. “Who’s Eames?”

Buckley fidgeted. “The forger from the British military who I was training with last month. He just gave me a few good tips, alright?”

Arthur shoved him away. “Keep your projections out of the dream when we’re working.”

“Okay, sorry,” Buckley said. “What’s it to you anyway?”

“None of your business,” Arthur replied.

 

The first time they both meet, Eames shakes his hand politely and says, “Pleasure to finally meet you, Arthur. Your reputation precedes you.”

“Likewise,” Arthur says because it’s true and not because he’d asked around about Eames or anything. Most of the information had been volunteered to him freely without his asking.

Eames grins before immediately going back to work and proceeds to be infuriatingly professional the entire job as well as the next job they work together too, and ignores Arthur’s attempts at flirting until Arthur gets fed up and just kisses him. Then, Eames finally takes a hint.

 

(Despite what anyone may say, Arthur does not tell Eames about how he really first met him and was most certainly _not_ disappointed that Eames didn’t call him “darling” when they met.

Eames makes it up to him by calling him Darling as often as possible.)

 

(Eames, also, on occasion, buys Arthur Shirley Temples at the bar.

Arthur pretends not to like it.)


End file.
